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Welfare Reform Bill

We on these Benches also look forward to the Government explaining how they propose to deal with this apparent problem and explaining whether people will be worse off. We have touched on this matter already, but one unbreakable thread running through all the contributions on the Bill from these Benches will be the question of who is worse off or who will lose—a question which in general terms I put to the Minister at Second Reading and to which I do not believe we received a satisfactory answer. Clearly, we will return to this matter as we go through the Bill. As the Disability Benefits Consortium points out, at the moment 16 to 18 year-olds can, while receiving incapacity benefit, attend up to 21 hours a week of education or training that would not be suitable for a person of the same age who did not have that disability. Like the consortium, we welcome this opportunity for the Government to state how they plan to identify students who may be able to benefit from ““disabled student”” rules under the ESA. We support the purpose of the amendment.